A work colleague of mine who lives in the bolton area has a Marlin (swb) with a 1600 in it for sale plus he says he has a spare engine which is a 2.0L fiat twincam it is registered on a Q plate but needs sorting for MOT etc. he's asking £1200 i have details if anyone is interested.

This morning called at a race car engine tuners at Barnetby Dennis Vessy's who told me what the problem could be with the poor idling, and sold me a couple of new diapham's.

I got home tonight took the carb a part, cleaned every jet, found the problem was an O ring on the Idle jet fitted in the side of the carb. It had gone hard and split so leaking air. According to the book and the jets the carb is off a 1600 GT Capri.

So I spent my sunny weekend doing odd jobs on the car, Decided it was time to fit the metric studs in the back axle.

I bought the studs before I bought the car, sat in a bag covered in oil in the garage for a while. Out comes the blowlamp, big 'ammer and other bits and bobs to get it sorted. Old ones were a nice tight fit but came out with just a few carefully placed whacks with a 2 1/2 lb'er. Got the new ones ground to the same length and fitted. Checked all the back brakes while the…

Found the idle problem, accelerator diaphgram had a hole in, and the idle diaphgram is also a bit tired, so changed them. It had was the wrong size accelerator diaphgram fitted, so fitting the right one as got rid of the flat spot on accelerating.

I also found that the heater fan as a broken wire, which can't be fixed without taking the dash out first, and that's not going to happen ( Steve stop laughing).

But just to make up for that, looking through the bits box I found some…

Well looks like the car is just about ready for the MOT. Fitted a drivers side mirror today, fitted air filters and airbox, sorted the fuel pipes and filter and fitted the fuel gauge properly. Took it for a quick spin on private roads and all seems well apart from the throttle getting stuck and a high idle, adjusted the idle and fixed the spring so just tyre pressures left.

Fingers crossed for friday. Only thing that seems a bit dodgy is the handbrake. Carbs may need setting up as it… Continue